


Charcoal and Indigo

by poppunkwolf



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: Drama, F/F, Family, Fear, Fluff, Friendship, Gen, Magic, Mild Kink, Mythical Beings & Creatures, Relationship Abuse, Relationship(s), Romance, Witchcraft, some mild dom/sub
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-30
Updated: 2016-06-30
Packaged: 2018-07-19 07:16:51
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,950
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7351198
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/poppunkwolf/pseuds/poppunkwolf
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>She did not expect being queen would involve so much stealing away, so many stories, excuses, carefully crafted reasons to leave castle grounds, or to be gone overnight, or to eschew guards. But being Leopold’s wife was not a title, it was a sentence, so she made her escapes, and every time she left the castle grounds she felt like she had fled a burning building, a place whose darkness consumed her flesh with mindless, callous hunger.<br/> <br/>In which Maleficent takes Regina's fear and replaces it with endlessly burning love.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Charcoal and Indigo

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Oparu](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Oparu/gifts).



> * For the Dragon Queen theme "Fear". Based on Oparu's request "Fire".
> 
> * Warning: This story has themes of relationship abuse. There is one scene depicting relationship violence and several other moments that non-graphically refer to sexual abuse. I didn't tag rape because it is not featured or graphic, but I want this to be clear.

She did not expect being queen would involve so much stealing away, so many stories, excuses, carefully crafted reasons to leave castle grounds, or to be gone overnight, or to eschew guards. But being Leopold’s wife was not a title, it was a sentence, so she made her escapes, and every time she left the castle grounds she felt like she had fled a burning building, a place whose darkness consumed her flesh with mindless, callous hunger.

Maleficent’s estate was a sun up to sun down journey on foot with not even a handmaiden to attend her, but the whole way there she would have a giddy, dreamy, excited skip in her step because she got to see her again, and she felt so intoxicated by her presence, empowered by her lessons in magic, delighted by her attention, her genuine friendship, that every step along the flowery, weeded path made her feel closer to freedom. And it was always a chance to clear her head. Sometimes she encountered passersby on the main road and had to put her cloak up to hide her face, but once she crossed into the narrower path she was alone.

Maleficent would greet her at her castle, or at the clearing that had become their spot, the tree that burned eternally. From there the adventure was never the same: creating new spells, the practice of learning the classic ones, and once the thrill of flying on Maleficent’s back when she had been in an especially rewarding mood. The joy of spending time with Maleficent made up for the slow, painstaking learning curve. It had been six months since she’d trespassed gingerly into Maleficent’s castle and asked her to teach her magic, and she was just beginning to feel like she was getting good.

This evening on the narrow path leading to the castle, she felt a fire ball shoot right past her face with no warning.

She whipped around just in time to see black lace and blonde hair disappear behind a tree. She smiled, catching onto Maleficent’s playful energy.

“Maleficent!” she cried out. “Maleficent, I’m burned!”

It took not even a split second for Maleficent to emerge from behind the tree with urgent concern in her eyebrows, and when she did, Regina shot a fire ball straight toward her stomach.

“You cheat!” Maleficent shouted, with a combination of indignation and admiration in her tone as she vanished in a poof of charcoal smoke just before the fire could hit her.

Regina reeled all around, noting the few trees that she could realistically hide behind, then ducked as another fire ball came flying at her, grazing her shoulder painfully.

“That’s it!” she yelled, summoning all her energy. She held her hands out, ignoring the pain in her shoulder, and began to spin three hundred and sixty degrees, shooting fire at every angle. She had never tried such a thing before, certainly never thought herself capable of it, but in the moment of necessity she was pleased by the force and delivery of her fire balls, which exploded against everything they touched in the forest before burning out neatly. It took everything out of her, but she did not care.

Maleficent reappeared again further than before and began her own rapid fire.

Regina ducked, tumbling and darting behind a burning tree. Crouching behind the tree, she blindly stuck her palms out and shot fire in the direction Mal’s fire was coming from. “Is that all you’ve got?” she taunted, and then screamed with a start when the entire tree burst into flames.

Maleficent emerged from the other side of it, snatching Regina out of the way just as the tree began to collapse, knocking ash and fiery debris into the air.

“You could’ve killed me!” she shrieked, laughing.

“Could’ve,” Maleficent said, brushing debris from Regina’s braided hair, “but lucky for you, barbeque human is not on the menu today.”

Regina touched her cheeks as she laughed, and then noted her soot-covered palms.

“Well now you have a disguise if the need arises,” Maleficent teased. “If anyone asks, you can just tell them you’re Cinderella.”

“I don’t get it,” Regina said. “And anyway, why aren’t you covered in soot?”

“Because I won,” Maleficent said with a haughty smirk.

“I beg to differ,” Regina said. They continued to traipse down the path to Maleficent’s estate. “I’m far less experienced than you, yet I held my own just fine.”

Maleficent gave her an amused smile. “But you were never in any danger. It was a game, sparring, like when I was a little dragon child and my mother would surround me with fire and watch me try to escape. You need to know how to think quickly to use fire to defend yourself. And I’m impressed. The spinning in a circle was cute.”

Regina smiled before Mal’s next words wiped her cockiness away.

“But you have a lot of practice to do before you’d ever survive a real fight – one with a real enemy.” She reached out and waved her hand over Regina’s burned shoulder, healing it and repairing the material.

Regina decided to try to regain the upper hand. “Oh no you don’t,” she commanded. “You _hurt_ me.”

She could see in Maleficent’s eyes charmed curiosity about where this was going.

“And now you have to kiss it better.”

Not one to waste time, Maleficent slipped her hand around Regina’s waist and guided her off the path. Stepping backward, Regina felt her back gently hit a tree trunk behind her. Maleficent, breathing close, brought her fingers leisurely to her cloak, and adeptly undid the top button. Regina watched as she slid down to the next button, and then the next, with a casual, teasing slowness. By the last button, midway down her torso, Regina was not even trying to hide her rushed breathing. Maleficent slid the cloak off of her shoulders and draped it on a tree branch. She fingered the soft stretchy material of Regina’s dress, the part covering her right shoulder, and then slipped it down to reveal Regina’s bare skin.

Maleficent brought her lips, with agonizing slowness, to Regina’s shoulder, and left the softest, gentlest kiss upon her.

Regina let out a faint moan. She realized Maleficent had fulfilled her request and would not go further without further orders. “You have to kiss every place you burned me.”

Maleficent’s eyes, previously focused on the spot of bare skin like she had been enchanted by it, came up to meet hers. She reached up and stroked Regina’s face, tilting her chin slowly and gently one way and then the other. She ran her fingers through Regina’s hair. She traced them down Regina’s neck, then stopped. Regina felt her whole body flood with heat when Maleficent slowly, slowly, dropped to her knees in front of her, dragging her eyes carefully down Regina’s body.

“My poor girl,” Maleficent said, when she noticed the place Regina had intended her to find. Maleficent took her right shoe in her hands. “The fire must have lingered at your toes.”

“I am not poor nor a girl,” Regina declared. “I am your queen and I command you to kiss my foot.”

Maleficent looked up at her from her knees. “Of course, Your Majesty.” Regina was never more turned on, and fascinated, than by these power plays. Maleficent was the most powerful witch she knew, and a dragon, and Regina would never have believed she would be kneeling at her feet, removing her shoe and stocking, and kissing each toe with slow, deliberate worship.

After five kisses, each one healing her skin, Maleficent stayed where she was and looked up at Regina in obedience.

When Regina didn’t say anything, Maleficent prodded her. “I can put your stocking and shoe and cloak back on… or I can take the rest off.”

Regina liked to see herself as the one in command of this game, but she knew Maleficent could see the nervousness in her eyes and it all collapsed. Maleficent stood and took her face in her palms. “Let’s keep walking,” she said with a comforting smile. “I’ll teach you the healing spell when we get to my castle.”

 

The night Regina returned home from that visit, Leopold said to her, with calculating eyes, “Let us all spend the evening together as a family."

Having to spend time at all with Leopold and the spoiled, pretentious child he wanted everyone to be obsessed with served as a punishment in itself, but Regina could sense something up his sleeve and was not surprised when she entered Snow White’s room and saw the two of them sitting on cushions by her fireplace with a book entitled _To Slay the Dragon_.

“Father suggested we all read together,” Snow informed her, sitting poised with the book in her lap and her hands folded over the hard cover of the book. “He just got me this new story.”

Regina took her place beside them and said nothing.

Snow announced the title, “To Slay the Dragon”. She opened the book. “The dragon was mean and nasty, a trickster and a villain. The townspeople were glad when she had been slayed. But the-“

“Snow, dear,” Regina said through clenched teeth. “Aren’t story books at bed time a little bit childish? At twelve you’ve surely outgrown it. Let’s all do something else.”

Leopold stood, towering over her and Snow sitting on cushions on the carpet. “Reading is for all ages. Especially when there is a lesson to be learned.”

Regina looked up at him, at the anger in his eyes. She wondered if he would dare strike her in front of his oblivious daughter. She looked, defeated, at Snow. “I’m sorry. Please continue.”

Snow nodded for her father to sit, and he reclaimed his space on the cushion. “The dragon was mean and nasty, a trickster and a villain…”

Regina’s feelings of indignation shifted to nervousness and fear as the story unfolded. She had thought it was a story meant to antagonize her and reveal that he knew where she had been going. But it was also a threat, about a woman who used the dragon to commit treason, and was ultimately put to death. During that part, Leopold took Regina’s hand, sitting close enough to conceal his hold on her from Snow, whose eyes rarely glanced from the page.

When Snow finally ended the story, Leopold said, “A cautionary tale, don’t you agree, Regina?”

“You could say that,” Regina said, and Snow nodded along.

Regina breathed through her pain and the tears that threatened to fall as she tried not to acknowledge Leopold’s nails clawing into her skin.

 

Maleficent got used to seeing Regina once every few weeks, but her visits became less and less frequent, crawling to maybe once a month. She knew that usually Regina waited for Leopold to take his daughter and travel so that she could steal off with minimal questioning to Maleficent’s end of the Enchanted Forest. Sometimes she would tell him she was visiting her parents. In those cases, Regina would get away with an overnight stay before insisting she must go before he became suspicious and sent someone to investigate. Maleficent was apprehensive about the subdued panic she sensed in Regina every time he came up in conversation.

King Leopold. Maleficent only knew the stories. He had once found a genie and wished for the happiness of everyone in the kingdom. When Regina hosted her seasonal town halls where she heard the concerns of anyone in the kingdom, he would sometimes appear, showing everyone he was one of them and leaving enough of an impression on the people that it was common to hear about when they discussed royalty. His sweet daughter held the kingdom’s heart, and was growing up to be the fairest girl in the land, but also one of the kindest, if word in the town square was to be believed.

Maleficent could assume Regina was just being proper, prompt to a fault about returning home. But she had come to read Regina well, and she wondered.

They next met at the tree of eternal flame. It was nearly two months since Mal had last seen Regina. She knew right away that she had thrown herself into practicing. “I would think you’ve been doing fire magic all your life,” Mal complimented her, when the sun had gone down and Regina lit all the trees in their path like torches. They held a flame without burning, and the ones they passed extinguished themselves neatly. “Fire timing, very advanced. You’d make a formidable foe in a fight.”

She expected Regina to beam that earnest smile that lit her face whenever she received praise, but instead Regina breathed deeply and cast her gaze to the ground.

“What?” she asked gently.

“I already fought someone,” Regina confessed, devastation tinged in her voice. “A guard.”

“A guard from your own kingdom? But I thought they answer to you.”

“They should, but Leopold has the real power. And I’m sure he’s the one who told this guard to follow me. I don’t think it was his first time doing this either. Before that, I stayed away so long because I feared what the king might do. He knows about you.”

“Then he knows I’m a force to be reckoned with and that I’ll burn his kingdom down defending you.”

“That would certainly reinforce what he probably suspects is going on between us…” Regina trailed off rather than putting words to what was cultivating between them, the intimacy that resulted in shoulder kisses and toe worship and back rubs and hand holding under the stars, but which never went past a certain point. Regina always initiated these liaisons, and then retreated from them like she was afraid of being burned.

“Anyway, I’m worried,” Regina continued. “I used fire to render him unconscious but he’ll wake up and return to the castle. He followed me long enough to see me take your path.”

“I understand your fear,” Maleficent said. “But you don’t have to worry. I can handle it.”

“You don’t understand,” Regina said. “You’re in danger.”

Maleficent tapped Regina’s chin affectionately. “Did I ever tell you I am a fire breathing dragon who can destroy armies and anyone else in her path? I have never feared a human. I want you to take all of your own fear and give it to me so we can blow it away, like ashes in the wind.”

Regina’s eyes lit up. “Is that a spell?”

“Not everything’s a spell,” Mal teased. “Just use your imagination.”

Regina smiled, linking her arm to Mal’s. “So you’re the dragon here to protect me from the knight.”

“The storybooks never get it right,” Maleficent quipped.

 

“Since you won’t teach me the sleeping curse, I guess I’ll have to learn it myself,” Regina had announced some time ago in Maleficent’s library. Maleficent knew none of her books had the curse – because she’d invented it and had told it to no one – but decided to let her explore.

Draped upon a velvet chair, Regina flipped through a book of spells with great amusement. “This one is for turning your lover _back_ into a toad,” she said with a laugh. “And this one is for…” she blushed. “For invisibility.”

Maleficent admittedly possessed more spell books than she had read. She could sense, from Regina’s shy smirk and the delicate way she had pronounced each syllable of “invisibility” that it was a spell tailored for invisibility during a particular type of clandestine activity.

“Would’ve come in handy during the scandalous years of my youth,” Maleficent remarked.

Regina smiled and touched her cheek. “Myself as well, although I didn’t do magic back then.”

Maleficent fell into the plush chair across from her, a gesture for her to share.

“It was with Daniel,” Regina said, a twinkle in her voice. “After we made our plan to run away, once we’d decided to become husband and wife. I’m glad we didn’t wait. It happened only once, but it’s one of my most cherished memories with him. We were so close and so happy.”

“That’s sweet,” Maleficent said.

Regina nodded. “I’m especially glad it happened before Leopold. Now in bed when I have to endure his searing hands on my body, I have another place to go in my head.”

Maleficent sat up in her seat. “What do you mean? Has the king hurt you?”

She saw a flicker of fire, something angry and terrifying in Regina’s eyes for just a moment before she answered in gravelly tones, “Don’t be naïve.”

Maleficent contemplated how to respond to the words spilling from Regina’s lips. “That isn’t the way it should happen.”

“Well what I am supposed to do?” Regina replied. It was not a question, but a comeback. “Kill him?”

Maleficent suppressed her anger, her urge to go in blazing, swooping in to destroy this man the kingdom ignorantly looked to. She knew any such operation must be delicate.

“At least I can get back at that wretched Snow White,” Regina said.

 

Out in Maleficent’s courtyard was a pyre, a stone circle topped with wood and coal. The cauldrons sat in the middle, each one a massive pot that came up as tall next to Regina as Snow. Maleficent had created one for her, and they had practiced all of their potions side by side.

“I’m going to teach you the fire healing ritual,” Maleficent said to her.

“Okay,” Regina said. “But it sounds rather simple, like something I could teach myself. I’m ready for you to teach me how to dematerialize. From home, I could poof here in an instant instead of travelling all day.”

“You’d be able to poof yourself as far as you could see,” Maleficent corrected her. “Which wouldn’t even be far in those woods. And it would be exhausting. You’d do it five times and need to rest for half the day. It would end up being faster and safer to walk.”

“Oh,” Regina said simply.

Maleficent continued. “Your readiness to do a spell is not just about skill. Sometimes it’s any number of factors, like what lies in your heart,” Maleficent said, taking Regina’s hand and placing it over Regina’s heart. “It’s the full moon, and I want you to learn it now.”

In the courtyard, Mal sent Regina to gather course, dry sand under the light of the moon. She was to gather it in a wicker basket using just her hands to scoop it. She came back holding the basket and poured half the sand into each cauldron.

Maleficent had already said she would gather the wildflowers and returned moments later with lavender in hand. Her eyes widened when she poked her head into the two cauldrons.

“Did you do this?” she asked.

“Of course,” Regina said. “You told me to.”

Maleficent took her eyes off of the sand to look at her and said, “I wanted you to gather the sand, not put it in yet. Bad luck befalls any witch who uses another witch’s cauldron. That’s why I got you your own.”

Regina’s eyes widened, but Maleficent continued. “But I have a solution. A cauldron will recognize two masters with a simple ceremony. But this ceremony is… well it means something important,” she explained. “It requires a lot of trust. The only women I’ve known who have done it are couples. But you don’t have to be. You just have to be trusting enough of that person to partially link your magic to theirs. You’ll be more attune to each other’s magic and each other in general.”

“So you have to be able to trust my magic,” Regina fixated.

“And I do.”

Regina nodded. “I’m ready.”

Maleficent handed her half of the lavender flowers. “Take my hand.”

Regina clasped her left hand with Maleficent’s right.

“When I squeeze your hand, we both drop the lavender in,” Mal directed.

When she felt Maleficent squeeze her hand, they each dropped the lavender into their respective cauldrons. The flowers landed at the bottom with an uneventful grace.

“Now this is important,” Mal said. “We have to light the fire underneath, together at once. I’ll give your hand a squeeze.”

Regina felt Maleficent’s hand tighten around hers, and she opened her mind to the feelings that Mal had taught her to summon to conjure her magic.

She thought about Snow White’s smug smile as her father praised her fair beauty at her latest birthday, dancing with her while Regina sat alone and ignored.

She thought about Rumpelstiltskin abandoning her early on, treating her like a disappointment. Maleficent had said yes, had made room in her life for her just when she’d felt the most despair.

She thought of her husband, and his nails clawing into her wrist, drawing blood as he sat and listened to his daughter’s voice like nothing was wrong. About how his hands struck bruises that felt new long after they healed. How his hands on her flesh at night felt like the burning of being branded.

Here and now though, Maleficent’s hand in hers felt like the opposite of that, like being freed.

The fire ball emerged from both of their hands and flew to the area beneath the cauldrons, where the wood and coal lit up in familiar red flames.

From each cauldron rose a cloud of charcoal-indigo smoke, with similar colored fire glowing within, distinct from the red flames beneath. The smoke emerged in wisps, then in abundant clouds of vibrant color.

Maleficent’s gaze stayed fixed on the gray and purple rising from each cauldron and practically engulfing them. “Our magics are merging,” she said. The colors of the smoke swirled together, and the colors of the fire flickered like two living souls dancing, playing.

It was a purity potion, a cleansing fire meant to heal and clarify, and as she stood there in its light, its warmth and smoke, she could hardly feel a grasp of the anger and pain she had channeled into the fire in the first place. She felt like she might be lifted up at any minute, like she might fly.

Maleficent turned to her, and put both arms around her, pulling her close in the center of the smoke swirling a protective aura around them. Mal put her forehead against hers. “Do you feel that?”

Regina nodded, feeling the smoke in her head, in her lungs, between and around them. She felt so free, and at the same time she had never felt more closely tied to Maleficent, her teacher, her friend. Something more.

“That’s what happens when you let go of your hate. There’s nothing you can do to that little girl that you won’t regret someday. I spent so long trying to destroy Briar Rose, and all I did was ruin myself.”

Regina let the healing smoke fill her soul, trying so hard to resent Maleficent’s words but knowing she could not. “Well what am I supposed to do now?”

Mal brushed her cheek. “It doesn’t mean you can’t fight for a happy ending. And it doesn’t mean you don’t deserve justice.”

 

Regina led Maleficent down the stairs, looking up every few moments to be sure her eyes were really closed. “Watch your step,” she warned.

“This is my castle, I know every stair even with my eyes closed,” Maleficent replied.

Regina brought Maleficent to the middle of the room. “Open your eyes.”

It was pitch dark. She took Maleficent’s hand. She used her other hand to light a torch on a mantle. Turning to another corner of the room, she pointed at another candle, which lit up. She turned in a circle as she lit torch after torch, candle after candle, until the room was glowing dimly with romantic lighting. At their feet, she lit the fireplace near them. Fresh fruit was laid out on the picnic blanket.

“Love the presentation,” Maleficent remarked.

“I wanted to do something nice for you, since you’ve done so much for me.”

“It’s lovely,” Maleficent said.

The fire place burned a warm, comforting glow.

The fed each other apple slices as they made carefree banter. She put her head in Maleficent’s lap, and Maleficent fed her grapes with the teasing remark that “Her Highness should not be expected to pluck fruit from a stem like a common peasant.”

Mal stroked Regina’s hair as she lay in her lap.

Regina, looking up at her, asked, “You mentioned you know every stair of this castle. How long have you lived here?”

Maleficent stopped her caressing, taking on a pondering expression. “I wouldn’t even know. Keeping track of time is much more important for mortals than it is for me.”

“What about a year and a half ago?” she asked. “What was your life like?”

“Well, I remember that I answered a lot fewer questions,” Maleficent teased. “What’s this about?”

“I was thinking about time. About how it feels like it’s been so long since I came to live in the castle, but it hasn’t been. And how I don’t get to call myself a widow, but I feel like one after losing Daniel. And then I’m supposed to rule an entire kingdom of people. Whether they starve or eat, send their children to school or have them toil in ignorance has much to do with my decisions. All the while, I must act as a mother to a girl I’m not even old enough to have given birth to. And I have to do it all while searching for a spell to numb the pain of my molars growing in.”

Maleficent smiled affectionately at her. “I have a whiskey that’ll take the pain right away.”

Regina giggled, nuzzling against her. “Let’s try it next time.”

Maleficent seemed content to just sit, stroking her hair.

“I was also thinking about my parents,” Regina said. “About how my mother put me in this situation and my daddy didn’t have the power to do anything.”

“Sometimes people want the best for us and don’t think about how that may harm us,” Mal replied.

“What is your mother like? Other than being someone who made a game of dropping you in rings of fire.”

“When she wasn’t testing my survival skills,” Maleficent said, “she was just… abundant. Full of love. Full of jokes. Full of happiness. A big part of what pulled me back from my Briar Rose revenge was imagining the kind of mom I wanted to be and it wasn’t one who had hurt another mom’s child.”

“Where is your mother now?”

Regina saw Maleficent avert her gaze, directing it to the fire. “A prince from a faraway land killed her.”

“I’m so sorry.”

Mal took Regina’s hand. “I’m okay now. You lose someone and you think you will suffer forever, but as someone who has a realistic grasp on forever, I promise it can get better over time.”

Regina lay in silence. She then said, “I used to feel like I could never love someone else after losing Daniel. That to do so would be to replace him. Now I know that’s not true.” She sat up, looking into Maleficent’s eyes. “But I do feel that I would never put myself back together if I lost you too.”

Maleficent stroked her cheek. “Is that what you’re afraid of?”

Regina nodded.

“Regina, I meant what I said before,” Mal promised. “I can save myself, and I can protect you from anything.”

Regina practiced the words over and over in her head before breathing, “What if I want to leave the king?”

Maleficent, still holding her hand, took her fingers and kissed them. “Let’s go to war then.”

 

The town hall was always the fullest day of the season. Leopold took care of trade, commerce, taxes, and any issues he considered “real”. But there were other problems, and she was expected to address them through the open forum. Snow had begun to attend these meetings, which increased their popularity, especially with children. As a people, the denizens of the kingdom loved a hero, adored a star. She held their hearts as the embodiment of the kingdom’s future.

The first citizens to speak were a rowdy group of neighbors who insisted there was a witch in the forest whose house was made of candy and who ate children and also she was blind. “We need to put up signs at least one hundred paces from her house so that the children know to stay away from her,” one of the people suggested. They argued over what the pictures on the signs should look like, since their smallest children could not read but an image of a witch eating a child would be too complex.

“Your children should be free to play,” Snow announced. “This witch’s awful actions should be stopped at all costs, rather than making your children harder for her to catch. We will send representatives to investigate her, and if your claims are probable we will have a trial here in the castle.”

Regina watched the people as they nodded amongst themselves, the apprehension in their collective energy lessening. She was impressed by Snow’s succinct problem-solving and reassuring command over the crowd.

Then there was the troll bridge, and the confusion over who could charge people to cross it now that someone had magicked the trolls into bugs who had not been seen since.

Regina had to explain to the people that the troll pawn shop, literally underground, was not an official kingdom merchant and that people should just cross the bridge now without ceremony. They seemed unsettled about crossing the bridge without a trick, as if some bad luck would transpire, so Regina appointed a beggar (who had come just for the free refreshments) to live in the troll house under the bridge and distribute riddles to anyone who passed. They would pay him in answers, and if they could not produce answers, in gold.

Then there was the lady with the basket full of purple flowers who was convinced that the royal castle would want to purchase them from her. “I thought they would liven up the place,” she suggested, clad in a charcoal colored lace dress with indigo lining peeking through, standing before Regina’s throne surrounded by onlookers.

“You’ve intrigued me,” Regina replied calmly. “Go to my conference room so we may discuss prices.”

The guards genially led this mysterious lady to an adjacent room.

Regina and Snow listened to more concerns about thieves and people misusing poppies and the lack of a fair and transparent promotion process amongst the fairies. There were at last a hundred people, and thankfully many of their concerns could be somewhat grouped into types and settled all together, including the dozen kids, accompanied by their parents, who had come just to give Snow drawings and homemade sweets.

It was rather late once the people were satisfied and had gone their merry ways. Snow turned to Regina and asked, “What price shall we pay for the flowers?”

Regina, who had not taken her mind off of the flower merchant, not for a minute, said, “I almost forgot. Why don’t you go get some rest and let me take care of it?”

“Okay,” Snow said, gathering the armful of gifts that had been laid at her throne. She looked Regina solemnly in the eyes, so serious as she always was, and said, “It has been an honor to learn from you how to conduct the town hall.” She did a bow, graceful despite the items she was carrying.

For some reason, Regina had expected Maleficent’s magic to wear off. The sense she had felt in the middle of the fire cleansing ceremony, of being happy. Complete beside the woman she wanted to let herself love without fear. Of not being able to summon any rage, not the slightest bit, at Snow for spilling the story of her romance with Daniel in the chain of events that had led to her forced marriage.

“You’re going to be a wonderful ruler someday,” Regina said.

Snow looked at her with joy and surprise. “Do you think so?”

“I’m certain,” Regina promised.

Once Snow had left, Regina asked the guards not to interfere in her negotiations, and entered the adjacent room where her flower girl awaited on a cushiony guest chair at a conference table.

“It’s like an inner glow,” said Regina. “Like a peaceful, calm fire in my heart.”

“Whatever do you mean, Your Majesty?” the woman asked coyly.

“That’s what I feel when your magic is around, ever since our ceremony.”

Maleficent laughed heartily, transforming herself into her real human body.

Regina couldn’t help but smile, but fear nagged at her. “What if someone recognizes who you are?”

“They’ll just see some generic blond merchant,” Maleficent assured her. She looked down at the basket. “The flowers are really for you, by the way. They’re free and everything.”

Regina was drawn into the light mood but was also wary. “What are you planning?”

Maleficent said, “I won’t let anything bad happen because of my visit. I came to surprise you. And… I wanted to see this place for future reference, because I’m serious about breaking you out of here if you are.”

Regina was unused to experiencing these two parts of her life together. The abject and the enchanted. But she had only been gone from Maleficent for a day and was overjoyed at seeing her again. “Do you want a tour?”

Maleficent grinned like any townsperson excited to get special treatment in the castle.

Regina showed her the music room, full of instruments. She told her about how Snow played piano and harp, and sometimes they invited local musicians and held concerts in the nearby theater. Maleficent picked up a lute and played the beginning notes of a mellow, folksy tune.

She led Mal to the ballroom with its high ceilings and reflective floors. “This is where other royalty sometimes gather to dance and schmooze,” Regina explained and then looked at Maleficent with surprise and delight. “Oh!” She laughed. “ _Queen_ Cinderella! She did tell some tale of getting covered in ash at her childhood fireplace.” Maleficent laughed at her and took her hand. They did a carefree dance for a few minutes, Maleficent humming the same tune she had played earlier and Regina harmonizing in freestyle.

In the northern wing of the castle, Regina realized with dread that they were headed in such a direction that they could not avoid Leopold’s room. She cursed herself for not taking the other route, but for Maleficent’s sake did not want to be so conspicuous about her discomfort. Passing the bedroom, Regina said, “The king and I have both shared and separate quarters. This is his room and he is probably asleep.” Maleficent did not remark upon this, but did momentarily touch the engraving on the wooden door as they passed.

She continued on to the stables, and finally the garden. “This is Daniel’s apple tree.”

Maleficent said, “It’s beautiful,” making Regina smile. Regina led her deeper into the garden’s grassy area, and they settled against an oak tree.

“Guess who learned the invisibility spell?” Regina announced. She waved her hand in a circle, and the air around them swished indigo and then settled. “They can’t detect us at all.” She reached to put her hand on Maleficent’s waist, but Maleficent stopped her with a subtle touch.

“You don’t have to be loyal to him,” Maleficent said. “And you owe him nothing. But I know you, my sweet, and I understand what has stood between us. You want him gone first.”

Regina took a deep breath, and touched her forehead to Maleficent’s. She wondered what she had done to conjure someone in real life who understood her so well.

“It’s the magic,” Maleficent said, running her hands from Regina’s hair to her back. “I feel it too, when you cast it.” She nuzzled Regina’s cheek. Against her neck, she said, “And I don’t have to be magically tied to you to know what you’re feeling right now, to see the way you’re devouring me in your mind. How you want me out of this dress.”

Regina nodded, still feeling Maleficent’s face buried in her neck.

“Say it,” she whispered.

“I want…” Regina sighed heavily. “I want you out of this maddening dress.” Regina’s fingers crawled beneath the dress to trace up Maleficent’s thighs.

It was certainly the most sensual act that had ever unfolded between them, and Regina was nearly resolved to continue to seduce her when she heard the explosion and the screams.

The noise was colossal, and then the entire northern wing of the castle began to collapse, consumed by fire. The flames flared wildly, and black smoke billowed to the heavens.

Regina looked out in shock as the castle rapidly succumbed to the fire, then realization set in when she looked at Maleficent.

“Fire timing,” Maleficent said.

Maleficent’s gaze was fixed upon the destruction, and Regina fixed her eyes on the woman before her who had promised, time and time again, to protect her. She had delivered on her promise. The northern end of the castle was where Leopold had been sleeping.

“Let’s go,” Regina said, and saw Maleficent’s eyes light with the yellow glow of dragon transformation.

 

It was brutal, true. But she loved Maleficent for what she did. Maybe that was what it was to hold the pragmatism of a former villain in your heart. What man didn’t deserve to be burned to the ground, who was responsible for the acts Leopold was guilty of?

And Snow White was alive.

In disguise, surrounded by townspeople, they heard everything. The king’s lifeless body had been dragged from the fire. The queen could not be found, and was presumed dead. The princess was now the queen. Regina had sobbed in relief when she learned of Snow’s survival.

Maleficent loved her enough to come in breathing fire. The feeling of finally being free was like experiencing sunshine for the first time. They went home.

She made a protection spell and spent the whole evening drawing the protection chalk around the castle, but she contemplated the sense in her heart of no longer feeling afraid.

She smiled when she looked out at the horizon and saw not an approaching army but just the peaceful view, their joyous land.

On the first night, Maleficent laid her down at the fireplace. She felt the heated glow of Maleficent’s lips against hers for the first cherished time. She gave all the way in to Maleficent tugging off her clothes, and melted into the fire Maleficent lit between her legs, so desperate to keep her close forever, to have Maleficent never stop lighting her up from the inside. Nothing she had ever waited for in her entire life had so delivered on being unforgettable.

“I love you,” Maleficent breathed into her ear.

She said it every time. It was something Regina needed to hear, and she knew Maleficent understood that, knew she was just beginning to grapple with being someone who deserved not to be abandoned.

Mal taught her to use the looking glass spell to check into the town square.

Snow was saving the people. One week, and she had kept trade up, schools open, roads clean. Regina was proud of her, but worried. She was still just a child.

And then, one week from the date of Leopold’s death, Regina looked outside the window and saw a carriage approaching. It was that of Snow white.

She was not alone. Her carriage was led by Marcus, the guard who had first followed Regina. When they stopped, out came Snow’s governess Johanna as well, and Regina watched as Snow spoke to her briefly and Johanna got back inside and stayed.

Regina decided not to hide. She opened the door before Snow could knock.

Snow gasped in shock. “Oh, Regina! You’re really alive!” Snow seemed unsure of whether to embrace her.

Still dazed over this unexpected arrival and equally unsure of how to behave, Regina said, “Hello... Please come in.”

Snow came into the castle. “Hello,” Snow said, looking past Regina, and Regina turned to see that Maleficent had entered the room. “I’m Snow White.”

“Maleficent.” Mal bowed sincerely to the girl, and then said with a surprising lack of hostility, “How did you get past the protection spell?”

“Because I’m not here to harm you,” Snow assured them. “I came because…” she looked at Regina. “Because I needed to know you were okay. I never thought you were dead but I didn’t know how to find you. Then Marcus said he might know the way, and I’m so glad he was right.”

Maleficent rushed to the window.

Regina saw her eyes glow.

“He’s not going to hurt you,” Snow said, “now that he doesn’t work for my father.”

Regina froze. “What do you know about the work he did for your father?”

Snow said solemnly. “May we sit?”

Regina nodded. “I want you to be able to say what you have to say in front of Maleficent,” she said.

“Okay,” Snow said, and the three of them sat in the chairs of the living room. There was a beat of silence. Regina began to realize that Snow’s quietness, as she gazed at the floor, was much more intense, anguished, heavy than anything she’d planned for, even knowing what she had gone through this week. What she had gone through alone.

Snow said, “I saw him draw your blood at story time.”

Regina subconsciously reached to cover the scar. She could never even magically heal the injuries he gave her, for fear of him learning about her witchcraft.

Maleficent, with eyes like the tempest sky, followed the gesture and fixated on her wrist. In her true style, she stayed calm beneath the feelings Regina knew stormed in her.

Snow continued, “I didn’t say anything because I was so confused. This was my _father_. He never hurt me and he was so kind... But I finally saw it, and after that I saw everything. I know you never loved me, had not forgiven me over what happened with Daniel. And then I realized you could never forgive me, could never love me, because of him. I understand why you always came here. I saw him bribe Marcus to follow you, and…” Her face crumpled and wailed loud, anguished tears. “I didn’t mean it. I’m so sorry.” She buried her face in her hands and sobbed uncontrollably. “I didn’t mean… I didn’t mean to kill my father.”

Regina sat in silence, confused and astonished.

Snow continued, wailing loudly, “I just wanted to burn down the personal treasury near his bedroom. It would be enough that he would choose not to pay guards to stalk you, or authors to write books about you and – and her.” She looked up and fixed her devastated gaze upon Regina. “I started the fire.”

Regina tried to wrap her mind around everything she thought she knew versus what was now unfolding.

“Honey,” Maleficent said to Snow, “you cannot blame yourself for it. It was an accident.”

“But… but I thought you set the fire,” she said to Maleficent.

Maleficent said, “I’ve spent the last week believing the same about you. You mastered fire timing, and then it happened.”

“But you touched his door so intentionally,” Regina said.

“I touched a lot of things in the castle,” Mal said. “But I didn’t curse them.”

“Neither of us killed Leopold,” Regina realized.

“It was me,” Snow sobbed. “I poured gasoline, and I lit a fuse, and I ran. And now my father is dead.”

Regina pulled her close. “I’ll protect you. You tried to protect me, and I’ll do everything to protect you. Okay, my princess?”

Snow sobbed harder. “I’m the queen now. How can I be queen when this is the second time my mistake has gotten someone killed?”

Snow White, Leopold’s child whom she had given nothing but resentment had not done what she did out of pure selflessness. She had done it because she hoped it would lead Regina to love her. After everything, that was all she wanted.

Regina said, “I forgive you for Daniel.”

Snow gazed thoughtfully at her. “I’m so so sorry. And I thank you. I know what forgiveness means to you, Regina.”

Regina continued, “You need to forgive yourself for Leopold. And I’ll keep your secret if you reveal to no one that I am alive and swear Marcus and Johanna to secrecy. But I don’t know what to do because you can’t do this by yourself. That crown is far too heavy for you to wear.”

Snow looked at Maleficent, and then Regina. She stood up, for a reason not clear to Regina, and looked at her for a long time. “I will keep your secret but I cannot bear this lie for myself. I’m going to tell the kingdom it was I who accidentally killed my father,” Snow announced.

“No. Snow, _no_ ,” Regina insisted. “You’ll be charged with treason.”

Snow turned to her. “Sometimes you have to have trust, and hope. You have to believe people will not turn on you. My actions were wrong but I have to do the right thing so people will see that my heart is pure. I believe I will be forgiven. But you could lead the way by taking the first step. You could legally pardon me.”

Regina considered the details. “I can return and reclaim my place as queen. I can teach them that Maleficent saved me from the fire and returned me when I was well enough.” She paused. “I want to be clear to you that this is true.”

Snow’s eyes grew. “You were injured in the fire?”

“No… but a lot has happened that I’ve had to recover from. And Maleficent has been there through it all.”

Snow looked at the two of them. To Maleficent, she said, “She’s your true love.”

Maleficent said, “Yes. And I will stay by her side.”

Snow nodded at Maleficent. “The kingdom will celebrate you as a hero for saving the queen. When you tell them you’ve fallen in love, they will see why. They trust me, and they will trust when I tell them they can trust you.”

In Maleficent’s expression Regina saw the contentedness of one willing to give all and demand nothing. Mal would come with her and that was all she needed.

 

This was how Regina came to rule the kingdom alongside her true love and her stepdaughter.

Regina relieved Snow White of the throne, but she also saw that Snow would lead her people well when she took the crown one day. She was a natural at guiding this kingdom. She knew the particular trust the people had for their princess, and she knew that their penchant for a hero would be a saving grace. Gathered in the courtyard, Snow told them of her travels to find the queen, of Maleficent who had brought her from the fire, and of her own secret, the mistake she would live with forever. They forgave her when Regina did.

Darkness is not easily erased. The past cannot just be burned neatly away. Leopold was dead because of Snow, and Regina refrained from thanking her, choosing instead to help Snow through her grief as best as she could. They focused on each other. She chose to love and protect the girl she had once plotted to curse.

And she and Maleficent filled the castle with joy. The people loved Maleficent, their hero who had saved Regina. Regina loved her for all the same reasons.


End file.
